CPU-Dependent 3D Gaming

Street Fighter IV uses a new, built-from-scratch graphics engine that enables CAPCOM to tune the visuals and performance to fit the needs of the game, as well as run well on lower-end hardware. Although the engine is based on DX9 capabilities, it does add soft shadows, High Dynamic Range lighting, depth of field effects, and motion blur to enhance the game experience.

The game is multi-threaded, with rendering, audio, and file I/O all running in different threads. The development team has also worked to maintain a relatively constant CPU load in all parts of the game so that on-screen performance does not change dramatically in different game scenarios.

I ran the Street Fighter IV benchmark at its lowest resolution (640x480) with all graphical features turned down to the minimum possible settings. This makes the video card much less of a factor in the results, biasing towards processor performance. Intel CPUs dominate here, but note that the 2600K does just barely beat the 3960X in the Intel DX79SI motherboard.

Comments

Wow, another awesome review by the Benchmark Folks!Thorough, detailed, and on the cutting edge as usual.Not to mention that it coincides with their timely reviews of the new CPU chips and the Intel "Extreme"(cough) motherboard - its put them all together in perspective so we know where to focus Mom's xMas gaming and upgrade cash!

I have a previous X58 Sabertooth motherboard that has the Intel Raid chip supporting 6x3gb sata drives plus the Marvel chip that adds another 2x6gb ports. I have my C: Drive SSD and another SSD for virtual machines on the Marvell and two raid 5 arrays on the six sata ports.

One question is: with the new configuration that has 2x6gb asus ports plus 2x6gb chipset ports plus 4x3gb ports, will I be able to support both of my raid 5 arrays?i.e. are all six of the chipset ports on the same controller, or are they logically split so raid arrays must stay within each set of ports?

O, and one more thingy: I see this baby has two fans integrated right into the motherboard to cool the components. Are these standard sized fans that can easily be replaced with aftermarket ones after they blow up or will we have to fly to Asia and wait in the cattle line to get a $99 cent proprietary fan replaced for one-k large?

Does this board support 2133 MHz memory without overclocking? I mean if the memory module of 2133 MHz with xmp profile on is activated through the bios, will the motherboard recognize it? I'm asking because sabertooth x79 manual guide says it supports only 1866 memory max.

We didn't test 2133Mhz memory in this board, but I recall seeing that frequency as an option in the popup menu where you select memory frequency in the BIOS, so I don't see any reason it wouldn't work...

Here you say: "And it's really odd that only two of the SATA ports are SATA 6G"

But in the comparo-graph on this web page:#benchmarkreviews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=833&Itemid=69&limit=1&limitstart=2

for SATA this for this motherboard it says:

4xSATA 3G, 4xSATA 6G

Please clarify, am I reading one of these pages wrong?

Also, not really an issue, but on this page it says:

"there are 14 USB 2.0 ports and 6 SATA ports"and"touted as a reason for not supporting SuperSpeed USB 3.0"which doesn't explicitly say that there are no USB 3.0 ports, but it sort of reads that way to the casual reader. On the other page listed above it says for USB for this motherboard:

"6xUSB 3.0, 14xUSB 2.0"

Thanks for the wonderful reviews of this cutting edge stuff! Its great to get all of this info so quickly after they are released.

Anon, you're confused. The section where I say there are only 2 SATA 6G ports and no USB 3.0 is the section on Intel's X79 chipset. The clue is the heading "Intel's X79 Express Chipset" in large type at the start of that section.

ASUS adds extra SATA 6G ports and USB 3.0 via third party controller chips, which is part of the "added value" they bring to this board.

I wanted to use G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1866 (PC3 14900) Desktop Memory Model F3-14900CL9Q-16GBXL with the mobo but have been unable to find out if this RAM is compatible.